


The Traveler

by terma_archivist



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-01-01
Updated: 2002-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:15:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26498473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/terma_archivist/pseuds/terma_archivist
Summary: Time travel story!
Relationships: Alex Krycek/Fox Mulder
Collections: TER/MA





	The Traveler

**Author's Note:**

> Note from alicettlg, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [TER/MA](https://fanlore.org/wiki/TER/MA) and was moved to the AO3 as part of the Open Doors project in 2019. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are the creator and would like to claim this work, please contact me using the e-mail address on [the TER/MA collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/terma/profile).

  
**The Traveler  
by Raietta**

  
**Manchester, Missouri  
June 17, 1989**

Ah, the fly-over states. God love 'em. Home of the best hamburger joints in the U.S. Yes, the Heartland of America might just be little more than a sparsely populated playground for incest and bestiality (farmers got lonely, after all); yes, America's Breadbasket might just be little more than one giant soy bean field; yes, the Bible Belt might just be the backwater embarrassment of the rest of the U.S.; but by God, it had some damn fine greasy cuisine. 

Federal Agent Fox Mulder, Violent Crimes Unit, considered himself to be, by now, something of a connoisseur of local Mid-Western diners. He had a very vigorous rating system. Usually. Tonight, however, slumped into the red vinyl booth of his most recent New Dining Experience, Mulder felt too drained and enervated to really bother grading the place. The restaurant, called Steak 'n Shake, had been recommended to him by local fed Urmila Subram, who was helping him and his partner on their current case. In fact, she was sitting across the table from him right now, busily chewing on a handful of thin, salty, shoestring french fries and slurping on a chocolate shake. Mulder, for his own part, was chowing down something called a pattie melt, which he'd viewed with great suspicion upon first seeing. 

"C'mon, try it, Steak 'n Shake pattie melts're great," Agent Subram had cajoled lightly, when he'd first seen the dubious-looking picture of the sandwich in his menu. "Or so I've heard. Everyone loves 'em, here." 

"Are _you_ going to eat one?" Mulder had asked, raising his eyebrows at her. 

"I'm a vegetarian," Subram had primly replied, and Mulder had snorted at the oddity of a vegetarian recommending a meat dish to someone. "I'm Hindu; it's my religion," she further explained. 

"Ah," Mulder said. Then, looking at his menu, he wrinkled his nose in suspicion. "I don't like the looks of it. Pattie melt. I've never even heard of such a thing before. Maybe I'll try a Steakburger instead." 

"Well, that's what Steak 'n Shake is famous for," Subram said agreeably, smiling. "See?" She tapped a delicate brown finger against Mulder's menu. "'Steak 'n Shake; Famous for Steakburgers.' Their fries are also great. And the shakes are to die for." 

"Hmm..." Mulder said consideringly, eyeing the choices. 

"You've never heard of pattie melts before?" Agent Subram said suddenly, with wonder, reverting to an earlier comment. 

"Nope." 

"What, DC doesn't have any burger joints? You must've been raised in a cave." 

"Quit heckling me, lady," Mulder mock-whined. "I'm trying to come to a decision, here." 

"Sorry, sorry." Subram held up her hands in surrender, then leaned back in her seat and returned to her own menu. When the waitress came, a cheery young thing named Susan, Mulder astonished himself by ordering the pattie melt platter. Agent Subram beamed. 

Mulder leaned into the back of his booth, spine nicely slouched over, shoulders slumped, as he took another bite out of his surprisingly good pattie melt (grilled sourdough bread, two kinds of cheese, two hamburger patties, lots of onions. Mmm, mmm!) and turned the page of an autopsy report. Their table was littered with crumpled napkins, condiments, plates, glasses, and papers and folders, ranging from autopsy reports to field reports to police reports to a preliminary profile on the latest serial killer that Mulder had been assigned to. He would've taken out the photos, looked them over, too, but he figured it might shock the other customers, all of whom were either families (three families; one single-parent with two kids, one two-parent with one kid, one two-parent with grandmother-type and three kids) or teeny-boppers (one group of seven teens, loud and obnoxious, one small group of three teens, slightly less loud and obnoxious, one teenage couple, on a date which seemed to be going rather rockily, if the sour look on the girl's face was any indication). 

Manchester, Missouri's Steak 'n Shake, a fifties-style diner with lots of black, white and red tile and cooks with those funny paper hats, originated in Illinois and slowly spreading across the states, was a family-oriented restaurant. It made Mulder both nervous and tired. Manchester was a suburb of St. Louis, a half a mile from its city limits. It scared Mulder, who hated and feared Suburbia. It set his nerves on edge. All these cheery, conservative people, smiling with their mouths but not their eyes, with back yards and dogs and flower beds and expensive public schools and a Wal-Mart at every corner (originated in Arkansas, also slowly spreading across the states). All the houses looked the same, and so did the yards and the dogs and the smiles and the people themselves. Varying degrees of monotony. 

Mulder had grown up in Suburbia. The memories were not kind. 

Mulder sighed and slurped at his shake. "Damn, this is good," he praised, and Agent Subram smiled at him. Mulder liked Subram, he thought. Tall, middle-aged, beginning to thicken out in spots, she was exotic-looking, Indian, with tea-colored skin and lovely golden-brown eyes, the color of amber. Mulder had never seen eyes quite that color before. They looked like stained glass. Agent Subram, with the St. Louis branch, had a sense of humor, and she didn't pester Mulder too much or act like she thought he was crazy, like most other agents did. Spooky Mulder. They just loved him for his profiles. Subram was different. She was an oddity of sorts, an Indian, Hindu woman agent in a field where women alone were rare, women of minorities even more so. 

"What did I say?" Subram asked, giving gentle cheek, and Mulder grinned back. "Did I not say the shakes are to die for?" 

"Indeed, you did," Mulder admitted, poking at the bright red cherry in the shake with his straw. "How could I have ever doubted you? I need to visit Missouri more often." 

Agent Subram lost her smile, and Mulder let his fade slowly. He watched her glance down at the files scattered across the table, watched her face turn serious. Mulder could feel the skin around his eyes tighten with fatigue and unhappiness. Yes, the case. It was a bitch of a case. Someone was stalking the suburbs of St. Louis. Someone who liked young families with children and pets, with happy homes and good jobs. Suburbia. Three families so far, killed in their own houses. Slaughtered. The wives were all attractive, the husbands good-looking, the children cute and cuddly. One family had had a dog, and it had been killed, too. Decapitated, and the head put in the microwave. The wife had been put in the fridge. One child, a little sister, had been found in the washing machine, her brother in the dryer. Pieces of the husband had been distributed into three different clothes hampers. 

That was the second family. The first family had been creatively dispatched, too. Husband, wife, two sons, settled on their expensive living room sofa, their arms removed and stacked neatly on the coffee table in front of them. They had had fish, which had been found, after some looking, in the garbage disposal. 

The third family, wife, husband, little girl, had all been sodomized after they were strangled to death. The father had been strangled with his own tie, the mother with her belt, the child with her jump rope. Rope burns on all their wrists and ankles. Duct tape had sealed their mouths. Other, more terrible things had been done to their bodies as well, other than the rapes. Mulder didn't want to dwell on it. He didn't want to think about it at all. The three victims, after their murders, had then been sliced apart joint by joint, every joint, and, like the second family, hidden about the house. The police had found finger segments in coffee cans, jewelry boxes, the candy dish among the M&Ms. Drawers had housed limbs. The heads had been placed in a row on the fireplace mantle. The house, aside from the dispersed body parts, had been extremely clean. No blood, no miscellaneous tissue, no mess at all. The only thing wrong with the house itself was that all of the pictures and photographs inside it had been slashed. 

Mulder sighed, remembering the crime scene pictures, the info from the reports he'd been given. St. Louis had asked specifically for him. Fox Mulder. He had an extraordinary track record. He was like the freaking Second Coming of Christ to the Bureau. Their golden boy. They called him "Spooky," to be sure, but they said it affectionately, except for his supervisor, Reggie Purdue, who didn't much like him. At all. But Purdue was back in DC, and Jerry Lamana, his partner, was currently running around the crime scenes, poking and scraping, waiting for Mulder to join him and start the manhunt in earnest. The Bureau really wanted this psycho. Bad. People were pissed. The media was getting antsy. Those in charge were getting anxious. Nobody likes a serial killer. They were starting to put the pressure on Mulder, but he didn't mind. He wanted the killer caught as soon as possible too, of course. Those photos, those reports, made his stomach cramp miserably. His head suddenly hurt. Profiling sickos and psychos always made him ill. He didn't like getting in their heads. It was dark and brackish and strange in there, frightening, too close. He didn't want to get too close. 

Mulder sighed. It was going to be a long, long day. He looked up at Subram, who was picking listlessly at her fries. "You ready to go?" he asked. Subram nodded. "Off to the crime scenes?" Subram nodded again, her amber eyes filled with muted, repressed upset. A professional, she only let it show in her eyes. Mulder's own eyes, an irregular hazel, were flat. He wasn't looking forward to this at all. He could feel the profiler in him begin to whir into action, that part of his brain rev up. 

They piled the papers back into their folders and stood, Mulder grabbing the check, which the Bureau would pay for, and Subram tossing down a tip. 

"Let's go," Mulder said, and they went. 

* * *

The third family's neighborhood had a playground and a public swimming pool. The playground, a square plot full of gravelly sand and wood chips, had a jungle gym with two slides, some monkey bars, a tire swing, two concrete tunnels seated above ground, and a swing set. Mulder sat in a swing and watched the sun set. 

Missouri was very hilly, and filled with forests. Tall trees and shy deer that skittered and ran. Ivy and vines and soft-colored flowers. And birds, lots of birds. Every inch of Missouri that was not concrete or building was this woodland. It was very beautiful, even to Mulder, who couldn't see the green of it. The Ozarks, right. Did the Ozarks extend this far eastward? Manchester, so far, was a smallish suburban city. The roads were small, the subdivisions isolated from one another by trees and streams and a river or two. The playground Mulder swung in was surrounded by woods, dense dark woods in the waning light, whispering and sighing. He swung gently, legs pumping only every so often, tie fluttering, and watched the sun set. It was beautiful, setting right over a dip between two hills. The sun itself was a runny yellow yolk, wet and shining, and the sky around it was a livid purplish lavender, fading to deep royal eggplant and then into dark blue. 

Mulder watched the colors of ending flow across the bowl of sky above him. The color was so intense it hurt to look at it. It was beautiful. The chains of the swing creaked and cried, rusty and tired, reluctant to move at all, giving in without grace. The woods whispered and sighed. God, that sunset. Great armies of clouds, giants, rolled across the lurid sky, stained as brightly violet and mauve as their airy background. They sailed forward, those clouds, like a wave of angels cresting and breaking against the dying sun, an army of angels. A troop of angels? A... hell. 

Mulder swung harder, thoughtful, the breeze he made combining with the evening winds to ruffle his short, dark hair. The muscles in his legs began to burn pleasantly. 

What _was_ the word for a group of angels, anyway? 

For pete's sake. 

There was a pride of lions, a murder of crows, a surprise of unicorns, a march of ants, a gaggle of geese, but what was the name for a group of angels? 

A herd? 

For pete's sake! One would think that a guy who'd graduated from Oxford would know the fricking word for a group of angels. 

Mulder swung harder, making a mental note to find out the word for a group of angels as soon as possible. After the case. 

The case. 

The case. 

God. Mulder shook his head, not wanting to think about it, about those houses, all that blood. The first two times, the killer hadn't bothered to be clean. All that blood, and those poor bodies. All that blood, the symbol of utmost rage. Mulder had stood in the middle of the first family's bedroom, and stared hopelessly. "Jesus screamed and ran," he'd said, dully, not a single note of inflection, and Lamana had looked away. 

Mulder swung harder, and tried to lose himself in the setting sun. His thighs sang. The day died like a calm, gracious lady this night, all glorious hues and gentle colors. The day died with graceful pomp and circumstance, and Mulder wished that he could just sit and pump his legs and watch the day die forever, and not think about the things he had to think about. 

Profiler. Profiler. His internal wheels were already spinning, cogs and gears clacking together, forming a ghost from circumstances and hunches, a pale, translucent man, as yet without color. A gossamer shadow on the blood-covered wall. Soon, it was only a matter of time, he would have the ghost all filled out, put flesh on him, a mind, a character, a motive, and a hiding place. And then it would be over. 

And Mulder would be able to go back home, and start over again the painful, tiring process of putting the old memories back in their cupboards and wells, fix up his own mind to nearly the way it had been before, only now there would be one more ghost residing in his head, to whisper advice from time to time and turn three a.m. into another wakeful hour. 

Mulder hated Suburbia. 

And so did the killer, he bet. 

The sun poised itself on the lip of the forest before him, bleeding gold, and Mulder felt the hurtful beauty of that setting wash over his face, his brain, calming it. Great swans of clouds flew over the streaming golden light. The chains screeched again, protestingly, and Mulder slowed the swing to a halt and watched the sun sink. 

Amazing... 

"Agent Mulder," a smoky voice said, quiet and calm, in the still, hushed, waiting air, and Mulder jerked in surprise and twisted in his seat to find the voice's owner. 

The man was standing by the concrete tunnels, tall and dark, all in black, with midnight hair and a face cast from shadows. He seemed comprised entirely of shadows, of absences, and Mulder tried to flick on his customary anxiety, his usual paranoia, but nothing came. His ever-present edginess at being alone with a stranger was suddenly no longer ever-present. Weird. He'd had it since he was twelve. And now, all of a sudden, it was gone. Mulder sat in the swing and stared at the stranger. 

"Yes?" he finally said, breaking the quietude of the ending day. Somewhere nearby, a bird piped softly. 

The man said nothing. Just stood and stared. His face, if Mulder could see rightly, was quite lovely. The parts that weren't obscured by shadow, that was. Mulder dangled from the swing and felt slightly ridiculous. He hadn't thought about it before, but now it suddenly occurred to him that grown men—grown _federal agents_ —didn't swing on the swings of local playgrounds by their lonesome, while wearing suits and ties, no less. He'd been caught being weird again. Damn. 

"Do I know you?" Mulder finally asked, feeling silly and self-conscious. He refused to move from his swing, though. So what if he looked like a fruitcake? The world at large could kiss his ass if they had a problem with it. And so could this taciturn stranger, whoever the hell he was. Weirdo. It would just be Mulder's luck if this guy was the serial killer, in some bizarre, ironic twist of fate. Mulder could imagine it now; after being brutally stabbed to death with a kitchen knife by the monkey bars, Mulder's body would be sliced apart and then jovially scattered across the playground and the neighboring trees. Maybe even bits of him would end up in the nearby pool. Who knew? Lamana and Agent Subram would find his dispersed parts the next day, after being alerted by a couple of panicked parents who'd taken their kids to play on the slide. Or, at least, they'd find the parts not carried off by birds and dogs to be gnawed on. Mulder could see it all with perfect clarity; Subram holding up a knee cap with unmasked astonishment, Lamana brushing sand and wood chips off of his severed spine. Then, after what was left of him was collected and placed in a large Hefty bag, they would— 

"No," the dark man replied in a low, rough voice, surprising Mulder out of his reverie. "You don't know me." He began to walk toward Mulder (who sat still on the swing) with a smooth and purposeful stride. Predatorial? Professional gait? Cogs, just keep on turning. The man's eyes, though shadowed, never seemed to leave Mulder's face. The gaze was piercing, and made Mulder feel like he was being pinned to his seat, unable to move or look away. 

It was a funny feeling that bloomed in Mulder's stomach as the dusky man came to stand silently before him. Not anxiety, or fear, or anger, or annoyance. Not any negative emotion. Mulder scrutinized it closely, turned the odd feeling over in his mind. Weird. It was the most unusual sensation he'd ever experienced. Like all of a sudden, this man standing in front of him in a playground in a neighborhood in a suburb in Missouri was the key to all of Mulder's resonances, the glowing focus of a million different gates, locks, futures, pasts, emotions, ideas, like there was an invisible cloud of glittering psychic butterflies hovering around him... Mulder didn't know what the hell all that he'd just thought meant. God, what a flake he was turning into. See what the FBI does to a man? Mulder looked up at the stranger, who was standing silently, regarding him with a most inexplicable expression. Like he couldn't quite believe there was a man perched on the swings before him. Like he wasn't sure at all that Mulder was really there. 

There was a long, profound silence. 

"You're blocking my sunset," Mulder said finally, opting for his personal brand of mild humor to break the silence. He pulled his too-long legs in under his seat, shifting uncomfortably. The sling he was sitting in was beginning to make his ass ache. 

The stranger just stared. Mulder wondered if maybe he'd sprouted antennae or developed a third eye all of a sudden. It would account for the man's disbelieving look. 

"Mulder," the man finally breathed, and Mulder was again struck by the low roughness of his voice. "God." Then suddenly the stranger was leaning down and Mulder was freezing as the man pressed his palms against his cheeks, as if testing for solidity. 

Yes, I'm really here, Mulder was about to say, but then his mouth was covered with lips and he couldn't get out the words and the man was kissing him kissing him right here on a playground and the sun was setting bathing the man's face in gold but Mulder couldn't see he was suddenly blind and this was so bizarre that Mulder just sat and let himself be gently devoured _. You should be kneeing this man in the groin_ , a voice in his head told him conversationally. He continued to let the stranger suck face with him. _Do you realize that a man is kissing you? In public?_ Yes, he did. _Well. Just so long as you know._ The voice wandered away. 

Then suddenly the man released Mulder's mouth, which was tingling strangely, and stepped back, still staring intently. The odd feeling inside of Mulder unfurled another petal, continued to glow quietly. Beyond, the sun began to slip behind the dip in the two hills. Clouds flared with color. The forest of the hills was a black mass against the lurid sky, and shadows were twining around the playground equipment, sliding over the man before him. The stranger's chest was heaving, as if instead of kissing Mulder, he'd just finished a marathon. Mulder himself just dangled motionlessly, too shocked to even breathe properly. His whole body was humming under that strange feeling, like the psychic butterflies had now descended over _him_ , like his skin was trying to burst into soft flame. Warm. He was so warm, it was so strange, this feeling. What the hell was going on, here? 

"You're supposed to knee me in the groin," the stranger finally said, his breathing now under control. His back was to the setting sun, and the light haloed his black hair, outlined the edges of his features, which were sharp and soft and strange, all at the same time. He had lovely eyes, and a cute little nose, and an impossibly perfect mouth. It was, altogether, the face of an adorable little boy, but just underneath the skin a deadly fire seemed to burn. 

"Oh, I am?" Mulder replied, his voice faint and stunned. He felt like he was floating under water, or perhaps suspended in a more viscous fluid, like glue or liquor or maple syrup. His calm was astonishing, his astonishment calm. "Sorry." 

"I just kissed you, you know," the stranger continued casually, informing him, it appeared, his eyes never leaving Mulder's face. 

"Well, yeah," Mulder agreed, dazedly, "that's the conclusion I came to, as well." 

"Fuck," the man said quietly, and leaned back down and claimed his mouth again. Fireworks bloomed softly, and in slow motion, behind Mulder's eyelids. The kiss this time was full of heat, passion, searing and hard. _He's doing it again!_ the voice told him, returning. _You don't even know this guy's name! Need I remind you that you should be kneeing him in the groin, right now?_ Mulder didn't care. He couldn't. It felt so fucking _right_. As if... as if... well, hell. Mulder didn't know what "as if" he was searching for, but it felt so _right_. There wasn't a thing he could do to stop this. It felt impossible, as if his body and mind were locked in some sort of fugue state, some old code for bizarre stasis finally punched in. Gentle bliss was pouring into his mouth, straight from the man's lips. Soft, very, very soft, and firm. Teeth. Nip, tug, a little sharp, very good. Then a tongue. Then the fireworks slowly peeling outward behind his closed eyes suddenly burst into atom bombs detonating and his whole world slid sideways as his mouth was thoroughly plundered. Showers of sparks. Blue lightning. 

And then, just when he was about to collapse from lack of oxygen, just as his body was about to slide right out of the swing and flop into an untidy heap on the ground, just as his brain was about to disintegrate from sensory overload, the stranger released his mouth, and drew back. Mulder gasped raggedly, his heart thundering in his chest. 

"Jesus Christ," he croaked, gripping the chains suspending the swing. What the hell was going on, here? "Jesus Christ," he said again, gaining back his breath, and looked up at the stranger standing right at his knees with something akin to horror. "What the fuck is going on, here?" he asked aloud, his eyes wide with shock. "I don't even fucking know your name." The voice in his head snorted. _'Bout time._ Jesus. Yes, it was true that Mulder's success with dates was about as legendarily pathetic as Jon Arbuckle's. Yes, his right hand had seen more action in one year than most porn stars did in a decade. Yes, he hadn't had a real date or a real fuck in years, yes, he wouldn't know a mind-altering kiss if it smacked him in the ass, if experience had anything to do with it, yes, yes, yes, he might as well slap a "Doesn't Get Any: Pathetic Loser Alert!" sign on his forehead and be done with it, yes, he had no qualifications at all for this sort of thing, but still. Even with his sorry track record, Mulder knew that earth-shaking kisses like the one he'd just shared with a complete stranger just didn't happen in real life. This kind of thing just didn't happen in the real world. One's brain didn't implode from a mere kiss with an unknown man. Not in the real world. 

His whole body was blooming and secure, as if nestled into an invisible, impregnable shell. A happy little egg. What the fuck was going on? 

The stranger suddenly grinned. It made him transform from merely lovely to breathtaking. His features were caressed with violet and plum. "My name is Alex," he told him, grinning even wider, as if he'd just said something insane, something incredible, something unbelievable, and he was grinning at Mulder, grinning right into his eyes, straight into him, and Mulder knew without understanding that it was love in the other man's smile, in the other man's eyes, love and perhaps even adoration. It froze his blood with astonishment. 

"Alex," the man said again, his smile blinding, "it's Alex, my name is Alex." And then he was laughing. 

Mulder sat in the swing and stared. 

"Dear God, dear God," the man was crooning, laughing like a lunatic, but joyfully, as if he'd come back from the dead, as if he'd found a missing piece of himself long thought lost, as if he'd seen something beautiful, worth hurting for, something amazing. "It's incredible, Jesus, can't be true, amazing, amazing," the man, Alex, said aloud, laughing, and there was pain there, too, behind the strange joy, and Mulder sat and wondered what weird plotline had he stumbled into. 

"Dear God," the man sighed, staring at Mulder, "you're here. You're so young. Your eyes aren't hard. Just look at you, just look at you." 

"I..." Mulder began, floundering helplessly. "I gotta get out of here. This is nuts." And then the stranger stepped right up against Mulder, knees against knees, hands caressing his face, outlining his jaw, tracing an eyebrow, sliding along his nose, limning his lips. Hands through his hair, strong, long fingers scraping along his scalp, flowing down his throat, along his arms, grasping his own fingers gripping the chains. The man smiled, his eyes clear pools in the fading light, but what color they were Mulder couldn't tell, so they must be green, and he stroked Mulder's fingers, played over his skin, smoothed over his knuckles. Mulder watched the man gaze at their entwining hands for a short eternity, watched the joy that glowed in those odd, somehow familiar eyes. 

Then the man turned those eyes to Mulder's, inscrutable and enigmatic. "Oh, no, you don't. No, no, no. You're not going anywhere." And his mouth swept down once more and claimed Mulder's, hot and wet and scouring, demanding, sweet and intense, lips pressed together, then his bottom lip pulled gently and nipped, a tongue coming along and soothing the bite. Brushing, then bruising, burning, demanding, those lips like fiery satin, then he was melting under the stranger's intense heat, his mouth forced open in submission, and he was being plumbed, every inch of his mouth, in this blinding, burning kiss— 

It was Mulder's turn to laugh, and he guffawed helplessly underneath the other man's wildly sweet onslaught. "Bodice ripper," he mumbled around the other man's tongue, his frame shaking with laughter. 

"Wha'?" the stranger, Alex, gasped, his own tongue stroking Mulder's. 

"The plotline I wandered into," Mulder explained, or tried to, "it's a bodice ripper. Just listen to those vivid metaphors. Yeesh!" 

He could see the stranger take an instant to think about Mulder's statement, then discard it. Mulder sighed internally. He was used to his comments being ignored, since they were generally too weird to pay any serious attention to. Ah, angst. An old frien— 

Mulder's collective thoughts took a big flying leap out the window as the kiss turned even deeper, and hands slid over him, slinking underneath his suit jacket, worming their way under his shirt and onto his bare flesh, sending shooting sparks along his nerves. Strong fingers teased his flesh, curving over his belly, counting his ribs, playing over his nipples, in a maddening dance of skin over skin. Mulder gasped into his stranger's—Alex's—mouth as his sensitive nipples hardened under the attentions, pleasure spiraling outward, rocketing through his body. 

Oh God, oh God, those hands—those hands!!—everywhere, teasing, torturing, turning his mind inside out, shaking loose every thought, every memory, until there was only one thing running through his head, one word: Alex, Alex, Alex, Alex, Alex, Alex, Alex, Alex, Alex—too much, it was too much, his blood was molten gold, his skin peeling from the painful pleasure of it, of those hands, that mouth, that mouth trailing acid kisses down his jaw, along his throat, across his collar bone, sucking against a hard, singing nipple through his shirt, demon rapture coiling through him, making a smoky trail down to his groin, his loins, oh God, oh God, it certainly was a bodice ripper, not that he'd ever _read_ any or anything, of course, and he was gasping, and the hands—the hands—the _hands_ — 

"Oh sweet Jesus, sweet fucking Christ, fuck, _fuck_ , Jesus goddamned Christ, oh please, _please, please,_ yes, yes, YES, oh Jesus God Jehova Allah Christ Christ Christ—" Mulder gasped, cried, sensation swirling over him, starbursts spiking from the stranger's hands, lips, all over him, and Alex was babbling, too, not making any sense, Mulder couldn't even make out the words anymore, and he wasn't trying— 

"Love you, love you," Alex moaned into Mulder's chest, biting down, "and you died, you were dead, didn't even _like_ you when you were alive, such a prick, such an arrogant, egocentric bastard, you and Scully, and Skinner, all of you, but never liked you, and then the warehouse, and then you were dead, and then only then did it come to me how important you were, it all fell apart, everything, and only when you were gone did I realize—realize—" 

"Fuck—— _fuck!!—fuck!!—_ God!—God!—God!—" Mulder flying apart under the ocean rush, his mind in freefall, clutching the man to him, ripping into his leather jacket, his black t-shirt, grabbing, squeezing, pinching, rubbing, smooth, silken flesh over hard muscle, supple, grasping, God it felt good—so good— 

"All over, all over, a pool of blood, so red, so red," the stranger was sobbing, gripping Mulder's shoulder, lips at his ear, biting hard at the lobe, tongue probing there. "Straight to hell, all of it, and you gone, _gone_ , oh God, dear God—I tried so hard, so hard, I tried fifty-seven times to change that night, stop it from happening, but never, not once, no matter what I did—living hell, over and over and over again, but now—but now—but now it's ok—ok—ok—you're here, alive, so sweet, so young, the X-Files destroyed you, made you so hard and cynical and hurt—Jesus—Jesus—Jesus—hurts so much—" 

Ocean rush over his ears, a loud, distant roar, he and the man pressed together and grappling on the swing, tongues and teeth and lips and fingers and chests and thighs and strokes and colors spiraling everywhere, so strange, so _strange_ — 

He was wailing, he was screaming, howling obscenities, praise, praying, babbling, and his stranger, this dark man, Alex, was harmonizing, they were moaning together, and then the gold from the sunset spilt over Mulder's eyes, swept over his body, poured along every nerve, and then exploded. 

When he awoke, he was still sitting on the swing, fingers frozen on the chains, which creaked quietly, hanging limply, exhausted and dazed. The man stood, draped over him, their sweat-covered bodies locked together, his legs between Mulder's outspread thighs. The stranger was resting his dark head on Mulder's shoulder, and the feel of his short thick hair scritching against his own stubbly cheek was amazingly sweet, intense, satisfying. 

Mulder looked up. "Damn," he said. The man stirred weakly. 

"What?" Alex asked groggily, not lifting his head from the crook of Mulder's shoulder. 

"I missed the end of the sunset," Mulder complained, and then could feel Alex's body shaking with laughter against his. "I was really looking forward to that sunset," he sulked, scowling at his nouveau lover. The stranger just laughed. 

Feeling suddenly very sulky, Mulder wriggled on the swing, shifting his sore butt, flexing his legs, trying to shove Alex off of him. "Hey," Alex said, and stood up, stepping out from between Mulder's legs. Then he reached up, grasped the chains above Mulder's hands, and casually lifted himself up off the ground with the chains, swung up his black-jeaned legs, settled them over Mulder's thighs, and sat down. It was a very impressive show of upper-body strength. Mulder would have said something clever, but he was too distracted by the fact that the stranger—Alex—was now sitting on his lap, groin to groin, face to face, his thighs over Mulder's, his hands holding the chains just above his own. Alex's eyes shone with gentle satisfaction. 

"Hey!" Mulder squeaked out, echoing Alex, and his stranger just grinned beautifully and twisted his hips against Mulder's, making them sway a little on the swing. "Kinky," Mulder breathed, letting the sensation of Alex's ass against his crotch flow over him while Alex gently swung them back and forth, driving against Mulder's groin, shifting back. It was a most delicious feeling. Mulder appreciated it, and the fact that Alex was holding a lot of his weight off of him by pulling on the chains. 

"It's called spidering, I think," Mulder continued, and Alex looked at him mutely, questioning. "When two people swing together on the same swing," Mulder elucidated. "It's called spidering. You sit facing each other, and pump." Mulder waited for the snort of laughter or suggestive leer in response to the word "pump," but none came. "The girls used to do it all the time in elementary school, during recess." Mulder smiled, remembering. "The boys—we—never did that. Spider. Too girly." 

"Oh, yeah?" Alex asked, swinging a little harder, pumping his legs. The shoestrings of his black combat boots fluttered with each kick. Mulder started pumping, too, kicking out his legs, pulling them in, kicking out again, and the two swung in synch for a while, flowing in and out, working in tandem, Mulder pulling in his legs as Alex swung his out, Mulder swinging out his legs while Alex pulled his in. The chains began to squeak and groan again in protest. 

"Too girly?" Alex repeated, prompting Mulder, and Mulder blinked. 

"Well," Mulder smiled. Their chests bumped, pressing together, then broke apart. "Girly doesn't bother me." 

"Good, good," Alex breathed, leaning back to put more momentum into his swing. The resulting breeze felt exquisite against Mulder's overheated, sweat-soaked body. The chains screamed in rusty agony, mingling with his and Alex's panting breaths, the occasional scuff of a shoe or boot against the ground. The colors began to slowly leach out of the sky, turning a vast, serene blue. The playground was very dark and quiet, the scream of the swing's chains echoing strangely and loudly in the darkening neighborhood. Along the sidewalk, lamp posts began to come to life, their lights flicking on automatically, sending out violet pools of illumination. Shadows spun and slid over his lover's face, obscuring his eyes, then revealing them. It seemed like some sort of game. Peek-a-boo. 

They just swung for a while, falling back, gliding forward, saying nothing. Mulder didn't feel like talking at all, breaking the wonderful silence of evening, the feel of this man on his lap, legs and arms straining, his thighs humming with tension. He didn't know what he had done to deserve something this wonderful, this incredible, this blissful, but it must have been damn good. His whole body was glowing still, singing with that strange feeling, and his mind was equally sated. He couldn't summon up the energy or urgency to question this, to wonder just what was happening here, why he was letting this happen. Perhaps it was simply that he was lonely, and tired. All alone in his head, he needed a way out every so often, away from his endlessly circling thoughts. A break from the usual tortuous maze of his head, filled with bright lights and vanishing sisters, dead men, bloody rooms, cold fathers, silent mothers, and even more silent men, men with guns and knives and sightless eyes, men whose minds he had crawled into, and now in return they'd crawled into his, and it was slowly driving him insane. 

"You're thinking bad thoughts," Alex suddenly said, breaking up his abstractions. Mulder looked up at him. "You should stop." 

Mulder was about to reply saucily, but a hand had appeared out of nowhere and was cupping his crotch, massaging it, and Mulder couldn't even remember his own first name all of a sudden, let alone any cheeky comebacks. 

"Here we go," Alex said with quiet glee, rubbing against Mulder's blossoming erection. Mulder moaned. The friction was delightful. Alex pressed harder against the burgeoning bulge, and then lightly scraped his fingers over it. Mulder moaned louder, harder, sensation swirling over him. Adept fingers tickled his tummy, stroked his side, pinched a nipple. Mulder was fast approaching ecstasy. The fingers returned to Mulder's straining erection and began to play there, expert and generous, until Mulder was issuing soft, pleading cries into the deepening night. Mulder let go of one chain to reach down and cup Alex, but his lover grasped his hand and returned it to the chain. "Let me take care of it," Alex murmured, soft as seduction. "Just sit back and relax." 

Mulder snickered, but then the clever, knowing hand was at his fly, pulling down the zipper, and then reaching into his boxers and freeing his erection—"Oh Jesus!" Mulder cried, jumping, and Alex unzipped his own jeans and suddenly guns were going off in Mudler's head, they were rubbing their engorged erections ("manhood," Mulder thought suddenly, and stifled an insane giggle) together, rocking back and forth, swinging again. The situation was positively surreal. Two men were basically fucking one another's stomachs together on a swing in a public playground in the middle of a neighborhood. At least it was at night. Mulder could just see them getting caught by a housewife taking her dog for their evening walk. 

"This is so illegal," Mulder muttered, pushing his cock into Alex's hand, while Alex shoved his own against Mulder's belly. Silk and satin and solid heat and steel. Oh, my. 

"Wh-what is?" Alex gasped, gripping Mulder's (member) and sliding his hand down its length. Skin whispered against skin, cloth against cloth. 

"Well," Mulder mused, pumping his hips against Alex's, delighting in the feel of his lover's ass shifting on top of him. "I can think of several crimes we're committing, actually." He began to tally them off. "First, we're swinging in a playground after dark. I'm pretty sure that that sign over there states that this playground is off limits after dark. If a cop comes by, we're toast." 

"Uh-huh," Alex groaned, doing marvelous things to Mulder's straining flesh. They swung higher. 

"Next," Mulder gasped, head spinning crazily, "we're having sex in a public place, which is definitely not legal." 

"No actual penetration," Alex argued, doing still more marvelous things to Mulder's straining flesh. "Not actually sex." 

"Doesn't matter," Mulder replied. He pumped hard into Alex's hand. "Improper Conduct. Third, we're two _guys_ , and we're having sex. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that homosexual acts are highly illegal in Missouri." 

"I think it's just sodomy," Alex said, sweat running in trails down his face, slicking his hands. "Not just blanket homosexuality." 

"Well," Mulder said, "at any rate—" 

"You're talking too much," Alex interrupted, grinding against him. "It's ruining the mood." 

"Oh, yeah?" Mulder began, but then flesh was sweetly teasing flesh, nerves were overloading, satin skin was rubbing satin skin, and more colors were beginning to wash across Mulder's vision, and soon he wasn't coherent at all. He was pulsing, spangled, and Alex was talking again, babbling, crying out, and Mulder was too, strings of words, _I love you, I love you,_ and the fire was everywhere, his bones were melting, it was so good, so good, so sweet, it would last forever, this moment, at the apex, the pinnacle, the cliff's sheerest edge— 

—and then he was going over, falling, roaring downward into the bliss, so deep it hurt, so incredible, so beautiful, plowing into it, he was being torn in two, into pieces, and glued back together again, it was _so sweet,_ and then—then—then—Oh, God, and then. 

And then it was done. He shattered, and died, and then after a while he came back. Reality stitched itself slowly back together again, and when he opened his eyes he saw that he was lying in a heap on the ground, wood chips digging into his cheek, his back, and he was entwined with Alex, legs hooked with legs, arms over waists, heads pillowed on soft flesh. He ran a hand through his lover's hair, then down his back. The other man shifted sleepily. 

"I love you," Mulder whispered, not even thinking; it just popped out of his mouth. It was, he realized after a moment of satiated shock, the truth. 

Alex moved his head, turned and looked up at him, eyes wide. "Do you realize what you just said?" he asked in a low, throaty voice, like honey on sandpaper. 

"Yes." Mulder smiled gently. 

"Do you mean it?" 

"Yes." 

Alex stared. "You don't even know my last name. You've never met me before today—before an hour ago. How could you possibly love me? I could be your serial killer for all you know." 

Mulder shrugged. He stroked the curve of Alex's cheek. The warm, odd glow still hadn't left him; he was enveloped by it. "I don't know how or why it happened," he said, running a finger over Alex's bottom lip. "But it's true. I love you." Or else I'm drugged, he thought. Nah. It's love. 

Alex just stared, as if his whole world had just tipped sideways and scattered itself to the four winds. 

"A host!" Mulder cried suddenly, his eyes growing distant and focused for an instant. His fingers stilled on Alex's lips. 

"Excuse me?" the erstwhile stranger inquired, looking decidedly confused. 

"The word for a group of angels," Mulder explained, or tried to. "It's 'host'." He paused, uncertain. "I think." 

"Oh, you freak," Alex said. "This is the sort of thing you think about during post-coital lassitude?" 

"Well," Mulder replied, "usually my post-coital lassitude is spent alone on my couch with a porn flick showing on my TV. My right hand isn't very picky; it doesn't care what I think about after the deed is done. The last time post-coital lassitude and I got together, I spent the time ruminating on the sex lives of Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog; if they were to do it together, what positions would they take and how would—" 

"Stop! Stop!" Alex cried weakly. "I'm getting a mental image, for pete's sake!" 

"Well," said Mulder. "At any rate, I don't think this counts as post-coital, anyway, since I don't think we actually participated in true coitus." 

"Sure we did," Alex replied. "On a swing, no less." 

"'Coitus,'" Mulder began. "Latin for joining together; stems from 'coir;' 'co' is 'together,' 'ire' is 'to go,' thus 'coi;' plus 'tus,' which is the suffix of the verb action—" 

"It's too hot for this damn jacket," Alex muttered, effectively interrupting Mulder's mini-lecture. Seeing as it was the end of June, Mulder had to agree with that statement. Alex began to shrug out of his jacket. Mulder helped him, yanking on a sleeve. The leather was soft and supple under his hands. Between them, the jacket was soon off, and tucked underneath their heads. Alex lay on his back and gazed up at the night sky. Great masses of clouds paraded toward the horizon, swallowing and then spitting out the moon, which gleamed barrenly. Mulder smoothed his hand over his lover's chest, stroking softly, committing the swells and valleys of muscle to memory. His hand slid under the damp t-shirt and traced patterns on Alex's satiny skin. 

After a moment, during which silence spread in comfortable rings from the couple, broken only by an occasional dog's distant bark or the call of a bird, Alex turned over and began his own exploration of Mulder's body. 

"My suit is ruined," Mulder murmured, leaning into Alex's touch. 

"Thank God it's not Armani," Alex replied. 

"Huh?" 

"Never mind." The two rolled more closely together, stroking hips and thighs and arms, spanning ribs, caressing cheekbones. Alex grasped Mulder's left hand and began to kiss each digit, sucking gently on the tips, then tongued his palm. Mulder meanwhile ran a finger along a deep, long scar that ran over Alex's abdomen. Then he fingered an old bullet wound, it felt like, by his collar. Alex's lips and tongue gravitated down to Mulder's wrist, sucking on the little delicate knob of bone, then traveled further, nipping and kissing his forearm. 

"Who are you?" Mulder asked, coming across another bullet wound, very old. 

Alex just sucked harder on Mulder's inner forearm. 

Mulder discovered an impressive ring of ghastly scar tissue circling Alex's left bicep. "Whoa," he murmured, exploring the raised skin, imagining how much it had hurt to acquire this scar. "What the hell happened here?" 

"Long story," Alex breathed into his skin, finally deigning to answer him. "All I can say is, you're beholding the marvel of the future of science; it's amazing what doctors and scientists will learn from starfish and oiliens some day." 

"Huh?" Mulder said again, baffled, but Alex just chuckled and continued his perusal of Mulder's body. 

"Never mind," Alex repeated, and then he began to once again pull from Mulder's body strings of desire and heat, until they were both writhing on the ground, twisting around one another like snakes, kissing madly. It was incredible, Mulder was flying through the sky, sailing blissfully, then he was drifting through the deeps of the ocean, lost in sensation, dipping and wheeling through the purest blue, whether water or sky, he couldn't tell anymore. The web of blood that usually held him in disintegrated, and he was free to navigate through pure rapture, roll in it, sink into it, rise up toward it. He and Alex soared together, and then they were engulfed by the sun, disappeared into it, and then Mulder found himself drifting gently back to earth, and finally came to back in the playground. 

He held Alex and kissed him, softly, on the mouth, the cheek, his eyelids, his temple. "I'm never going to forget this," he whispered, eyes closed, breathing in his lover's smell. "Never, for as long as I live." 

Alex gave a weary, sad chuckle. "Yes you are," he said quietly. "You won't remember this, any of this, which is why it's safe. Nothing changes that I can remember. Nothing's changed." 

"What are you talking about?" Mulder asked, looking at Alex, frowning. The woods nearby whispered in the dark, tree branches bowing and rushing in the evening wind. "Who _are_ you? Why... why me? Why did you come... come to me... and... and start this? How did you get all those scars? Where did you come from? How do you know me? And why don't I know you? And why am I feeling this... this... this incredible euphoria?" 

Alex kissed Mulder, soft and slow. "I'm no-one, Mulder. Just a traveler, passing through." He grinned suddenly, as if taken by a very subtle joke. Mulder didn't get it. "There's nothing you need to know about me. Nothing that matters, or makes any difference. Just enjoy this, while it lasts." 

"But," Mulder began, almost feeling panic, but the happy, sleepy, serene feeling swelling his body, those glittering psychic butterflies, still held him, kept him from caring too much. It was as if there was some sort of spell on him. 

"Please," Alex begged quietly, in a low voice, serious and sad. Mulder looked at him, and saw the bewildering, heartbreaking expression in his dark, sweet eyes, in his perfectly made mouth, in his tense jaw line. A sort of solemn rapture, a sad joy. As if he saw his greatest achievement and his greatest failure in the same moment. "Please, no questions. I don't have much time." He laughed, rough and smooth. "God, that's hilarious. You'd think I'd have nothing but time. All the time in the world. How ironical. But I don't." 

"What do you mean, you don't have much time?" Mulder demanded, frowning again, in apprehension. "Where are you going? Why do you have to leave? What's all this 'remembering' business?" 

"Oh, God," Alex cried softly, gripping Mulder tightly, burying his head against his neck. "Please, please. I can feel it coming. The change. What an imperfect machine, what a messed up technology. If I could, if I could, I would stay here with you forever, never leave, but I can't. I'm the traveler. It takes me, whether I want to go or not. And then you'll be gone again, and I won't have anything left. Nothing. Please," he said, his voice thick with tears. Mulder felt his throat go strange, felt his stomach tie itself into a painful knot. "Please, I can feel it coming. There's no time left. Don't say anything. Don't ask any questions. You won't remember this, I know you don't remember any of this, but please. Please." 

"Ok," Mulder said, and felt his lover's entire body clench with some sort of agony, some wild emotion, and he tightened his own arms around him protectively, grinding his jaw. "It's ok, it's ok, Alex, I won't ask any questions. Not one. Shhh, it's ok, lover, I love you, just lie here with me, it'll all be ok." 

"I love you," Alex whispered against his throat, and Mulder felt his whole body lose about a thousand pounds of hurt and pressure, suddenly lighten unbearably with joy. "Always." Mulder grinned blindingly, his smile so bright it ought to have lit up the entire neighborhood. He'd never been so happy in his life. "You're so beautiful," Alex continued, rubbing his cheek against Mulder's jaw, tracing a loving hand along his side. 

Mulder blushed to the roots of his hair. Beautiful. Oh, Lordy. No-one had ever, ever, ever called him beautiful before. He knew he wasn't, too. He was too gangly and lanky, and he'd never grown into his nose, and his lip was bottom heavy, ridiculously full, as if perpetually beestung. His eyes were a muddy hazel, constantly changing color. Beautiful. He could feel himself flushing with embarrassment. 

"You are," Alex persisted, as if reading his mind, snuggling against him. "So lovely. Incredible, how gorgeous you are. I could look at you forever. Beautiful." 

"No, I'm not," Mulder dissented uncomfortably, but then Alex was kissing him again, wild and sweet, blackberries in July, raspberries, cool stream water, soft as snowflakes. He was lost in a wilderness, a wonderful unknown landscape, one he would love to lose himself in forever, locked into that kiss. It deepened, and Mulder moaned. 

"Don't ever be afraid, Mulder, Fox, don't ever be afraid, or sad," Alex was babbling into his ear, licking the whorls of it, trailing back down to his lips. "I know it hurts right now, these cases, I know they're using you for your profiling, sucking you dry, using you up, I know it hurts, but soon you'll be somewhere else, and your whole life will bloom for you, and you'll have Scully, God how you love Scully, and Skinner, and you'll be home, so good, all for you, you change it all, you change everything, and you'll be so happy for a long time, with Scully, so happy, despite it all, despite the pain and the torture and the dead ends and the betrayal, and remember, remember, I love you, and all of this will soon be gone, and you'll have the X-Files..." 

"Please, don't leave me," Mulder whimpered, clutching him tight, fear spiraling through his belly. "Don't go away. Why do I feel this way? What is it about you that makes me feel this way? Why won't I remember any of this? Why do you keep saying that? Why wouldn't I remember?" 

"Remember that I love you," Alex was whispering into his mouth, holding him, not listening to him. "It's coming, it's here. The change. Remember, I know you won't, but remember, I love you. Always. What a bitch, I think we're soulmates, and this is how it turns out. What a fucking bitch." 

"Please don't leave," Mulder said again, eyes locked with his lover's, feeling it, an odd thing, he didn't know what it was, but it was there, the psychic butterflies scattering away, something coming over them, a strange humming, a shimmering in the air, of their very molecules. "It's so lonely, here, and dark. The walls are bloody and the children have no eyes anymore. The killer cut them out. Blood everywhere, and I don't even know the real color of it." 

"It's here," Alex breathed, and gazed at Mulder, the look on his face, in his eyes so strong, so fathomless with some emotion that Mulder felt himself falling into it, it was tearing his breath away, seizing his heart, joy and pain and love and eternity, all right there. "It's here. I love you. Never will I leave you, not really. I'm there, inside you. Right there. Always and forever. Love you, so beautiful, love you. Never forget that, even when my image is gone, I love you." 

"Not fair," Mulder said. "We never even got to fuck." 

Alex tried to laugh. The air was humming with energy, sending tendrils of charged lightning down Mulder's spine. He was tingling all over. What the hell was this? Did he really believe that this was really happening? That what he suspected was happening was really happening? 

"I love you," Alex whispered tenderly, stroking Mulder's cheek, his eyes fathomless with love, and then he was gone. 

* * *

Mulder sat up, staring sightlessly into the night for a moment. The moon peeked out from behind a veil of clouds, then hid again, coyly. The black Missouri woods rustled and shook, sending shadows flying. The playground was empty and silent. 

What the hell...? Mulder shook his head, as if to rattle some sense into it. What was he doing here on the ground? He brushed woodchips and sand off of his sleeves. His legs felt like jelly, for some odd reason. Had he lost time? He couldn't remember. One moment he was sitting on the swings, trying to forget his latest case, and the next he was lying on the ground, with a foreign leather jacket pillowed under his head. _Had_ he lost time? Jesus. This had never happened before. Mulder slowly stood up, brushing more woodchips and sand from his suit, running a hand through his hair. Had he been abducted by aliens? 

Mulder shook his head again, stretched out his neck, unkinking it. Damn. He'd missed his sunset. Shit. Oh, well. Time to get a move on. He'd finished up his last victims' house, had gathered as many facts, as many clues as he could. Time to start the profile. Mulder thought of bloody rooms and slashed pictures hanging from walls. He thought of severed heads and hands. He thought of a lone, thin man with blank eyes and a silver knife, who hated suburbia, who crouched in corners and breathed insanity. There was a serial killer to catch. Mulder could feel himself slipping into that unknown man's head, could feel himself begin to walk the killer's corridors, traverse his landscapes. It wouldn't take long, he could feel it. Lamana would be pleased. Subram would be grateful, would smile and lower her eyes. It was her town, after all. Yeah, it was going to be a snap. He could feel it already. It was why he was the FBI's golden boy, after all. Their little pet genius. 

Time to get going. 

Mulder bent and picked up the incongruous leather jacket, somehow unable to leave it there, something about it, the way it felt, the way it smelled, and walked away.

* * *

TITLE: The Traveler   
AUTHOR: Raietta   
PAIRING: Mulder/Krycek!   
RATING: Uhhh, maybe R, maybe NC-17 for language and M/K sex, and a very little bit of grotesquery...   
SPOILERS: None!   
DISCLAIMER: During a recent trip to Hollywood, I acquired the address and planned itinerary of one Chris Carter, and after a week of stalking him I finally had him cornered in an alleyway. Making the best of the situation, I "encouraged" him to peruse this story, see if maybe he'd like to get it published or perhaps even turn it into a screenplay for a future episode, seeing as it centered around his two boys, and all. Carter just giggled a lot and asked me not to hurt him. Wuss.   
DISCLAIMER, PART II: Dear God in heaven! There's two guys having _sex_ in this fic! The horror! The horror!   
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This puppy is a response to the RatB June "Hometown" Challenge! Of course, it's now July, but what the hell. Read it anyway. This story started out as a happy little fic, then promptly spiraled wildly out my control, eventually morphing into... well, actually, I'm not quite sure _what_ this story is, anymore. Enlighten me please, someone. Also, what _is_ the word for a group of angels? Or, for that matter, lions, crows, ants, and unicorns? Enlighten me, someone, please. SUMMARY: Time travel story!   
FEEDBACK: "And what is the use of a fanfic," thought Raietta, "without any reader feedback?" E-mail me at [email removed] and make my day, s.v.p.   
---


End file.
